I'll try anything...

To get out of teething hell. Tylenol, Motrin and Orajel aren't cutting it. So when things get tough who do you turn to?


Sophie?!?!  How can this strange toy help you ask? Apparently baby chews on this poor unsuspecting giraffe and all your teething woes are washed away.

So what if Sophie isn't enough? Can she really do the job? She is just a giraffe after all. 

A baby wearing a necklace? A teething necklace. But not to chew on. This is no ordinary necklace. This is made of Amber which apparently has some magical quality that controls pain. We shall see. I have one being shipped from e-bay as I type. I have left no stone or bead un-turned in my quest for relief from the hell of teething. 

What if the above methods fail? What then?

That should do it. For me anyway! 

Progress

I finally got an hour to myself to finish making my burp cloths! Next on the list: bills and taxes. FUN times.

The time a homeless man bought us lunch

Ok I promised some that I would eventually tell this story. It's time. Funny now but at the time it was mortifying!

I was discharged from the hospital on a Friday. My mom and Ethan were there to pick me up. Mike was with baby Cadence at the NICU and the plan was to join them. I was horribly emotional because I pictured myself going home with a sweet baby girl. Not leaving to go visit the NICU downtown, drugged up on pain killers and feeling like death. The nurse was kind enough to wheel me to the car because I was still hurting quite a bit. I'm holding it together at this point. Then we stopped at the pharmacy and picked up my pain meds and rented the breast pump. I'm still doing OK. We are hungry because it's afternoon so we decide to stop at McDonald's since it's right next to the freeway. I should note - this is also NOT what I pictured after being discharged from the hospital. lol. I pictured going home to snuggle a sweet baby. Not sitting in a McD's trying to hold on to my sanity.

We get seated inside. Ethan is in a highchair and I'm sitting with him while my mom goes to order. While she's gone I notice there are about 5 homeless men at the 2 tables next to ours and they are arguing and being kind of beligerent. Awkward. I try not to make eye contact, but at the same time I'm concerned about Ethan and myself at this table and wondering if I had to could I pick him up and run? (remember it's been 3 days since I had my insides ripped out of me and stuffed back in). I look at my phone and check my e-mail to distract myself. There's an e-mail from my boss about shared leave and mentioning that I could reapply given Cadence's condition. Ok now there is a lump in my throat. Things are breaking down. Now the men are yelling at each other. One of them starts yelling "I'll kick your @ss if you don't get out of here!".  Stuff like that. OMG. My mom finally comes back with our food and sits down. Then asks if things are getting tense with the homeless men. I nod. So she immediately gets the manager who throws them out. One of the men remained to finish his lunch (he was the only one actually eating).

I don't know what happened to me. I think it was the combo of the pain meds, the yelling and fear I had of the rowdy homeless men, realizing that I'm sitting in a McDonald's while my little baby girl is in a NICU downtown when she should be WITH ME, and the e-mail I just read. HORMONES. Don't you love them?

I bit into my food and then burst into tears. Tears are streaming down my face. I try to wipe them away but they just keep coming. So pathetic to be sobbing in a McDonald's. And embarrassing. OMG soooo embarrassing. I finally pull myself together and then the homeless man that stayed to finish his lunch comes over and tries to hand my mom some money. He keeps saying "I'm so sorry" "It got way out of hand" ect. And insists that she take the money even though we tried protesting several times and telling him that it wasn't really his fault I was crying. How could he possibly know why I'm crying? My mom finally accepts the money so that we don't insult the guy. We say thank you. What else could we do?

And that my friends is how to get a homeless man to buy you lunch. I don't recommend it. ;) I still feel bad that he gave us his cash. But I think it made him feel like he did an honorable thing and maybe that is worth more than a little cash?

Cadence Julia's Birth Story

Cadence Julia's birth story (warning: very long)

Sorry I'm just now getting around to this. It's been a very long week for us. So here is the full story. I went for my 37 week check up with my OB/GYN. Actually I was 36 weeks 6 days. I'd taken my last nifedipine dose that mornign and ironically after a month of contractions I wasn't having any contractions at all. I did notice that morning that it felt like Cadence had dropped. I was feeling some pelvic and back pressure but nothing to make me feel like things had really changed significantly. I did notice that morning that I'd actually woken up without the rib pain and felt more comfortable than normal.

So I get to my appointment and they hook me up to the monitor. Cadence's heart rate was up in the 130's range and very flat. No accelerations to be seen. Kathy the nurse was concerned so she had me drink a cup of soda. Then we waited and watched. Still no real variability. So she got my doctor and I turned more up on my left side. They were both kind of shaking and poking my tummy, we were trying to get her to "wake up". I'd also noticed a lot less movement over the weekend but thought that was normal end of pregnancy stuff. She was still doing at least 10 kicks so I wasn't terribly concerned. Anyhow, my doctor was worried enough about the lack of variability to send me to L&D. He also checked my cervix and I was dilated 3-4 cm which shocked me because I hadn't had hardly any contractions that morning. So I am still not terribly worried, just a little freaked because of the dilation! I hadn't packed a bag or anything because I was pretty convinced that I wasn't in labor that morning.

So I leave the doctor office and go to L&D. I called Mike to let him know that I was going to L&D for more monitoring and I was a little nervous. I asked him to leave work and come to the hospital even though I was "pretty sure" I wasn't in labor. I think I was in denial about the situation at that point. I got to L&D and hooked up to the monitor again. Still very flat heartrate but steady in the 130's. The nurse had me drink some cold water, cranberry juice. I hadn't eaten lunch so we thought maybe some sugar or food would get her HR up again. So I ate a banana and a muffin. Still no improvement. By about 5 pm the doctor shows up again and we are starting to talk about whether to break my water and get labor going. I'd had a few contractions on the monitor but nothing regular. He shook my belly HARD and she had a HUGE deceleration. Then in the next half hour or so the decelerations continued. He ordered stat labs because of my history of low platelets. Then they brought the ultrasound machine to my room and did a bedside ultrasound. The tech was looking for what seemed like a very long time and was mumbling to my doctor things like "No points for breathing" ect. Making me really nervous! Cadence scored a 2/10 on the biophysical profile. Not good. She also hadn't really engaged in my pelvis so they were concerned about the cord coming down if my water broke. So then we started trying to decide if I could try labor with the OR set up for a "crash" c/s if needed or just go straight to a c/s. I was bawling at this point because of my traumatic almost emergency c/s when Ethan was born. We decided ultimately that labor was too dangerous given her poor BPP score and decelerations. I had written out a birth plan explaining my previous experience with my spinal not working and almost getting a c/s. So the anesthesiologist was very very good about explaining everything and trying to calm me down.

She did a great job with my spinal and almost instantly I felt my legs go numb. My OB pinched me really hard with the clamps and I felt nothing. OMG so relieved at that point. I was still crying from nerves. Mike was right by me the whole time and I just tried to focus on him while they worked. I know it was just minutes but it felt like forever. Finally she was out. I heard my doctor say "It's a girl!!" and then I heard her screaming immediately. Such a relief.

Cadence Julia Pena was born on March 8th at 9:01 pm. Weighing 5 lbs 6 oz and 18 inches long.

There was meconium in my amniotic fluid so she was definately in distress. We don't know why yet. Her cord was small and my placenta looked "unhealthy" per my doctor. It was sent to pathology so I'm hoping to get some answers in the next week or so.

Her apgars were 8 and 9 and she was doing pretty good initially. They brought her to me for a second and I gave her little cheek a kiss. Mike left to the nursery to take pictures while they weighed her. It seemed like forever while they stitched me up. My platelets were pretty low but luckily the bleeding wasn't an issue, my doctor said I clotted off really well. They wheeled me back to my room and I waited for them to bring the baby to me.

Finally the nurse came in and said they would be keeping Cadence in the nursery overnight because her blood sugar was low and she needed oxygen. I cried because this wasn't what I had planned. I was to numb to be able to get out of bed to see her. So I waited for feeling to come back to my legs... but they did a really good job on the spinal. My legs were dead numb! My friends came in and distracted me for awhile. Around midnight my friends had all left and Mike and i were sitting there when my nurse came in. She was crying!!! So my heart was in my throat. She said that she didn't know exactly what was wrong but that they were working on Cadence. What?!?! I was sobbing. Still to numb to get out of bed and go see... I told Mike to get down there NOW and see. So my nurse stayed with me trying to say reassuring things while I just layed there and sobbed hysterically. An HOUR AND A HALF later we finally had some info. Neonatologist came in and told us that Cadence had acute respiratory distress and was intubated and that they were transferring her to Swedish down town. More sobbing hysterically from me. This was like a horrible nightmare. They promised I could see her before they transferred her. A bit later they rolled her isolette into my room and I could see her little face but that was it. She was covered in wires and tubes and I was sobbing again. I was still to numb to get up but I managed to sit up enough to see her. Then they were gone.

I spent the next 3 days in the hospital trying to get my pain under control and crying most of the time because I was worried about Cadence. I couldn't believe this was happening. Cadence was intubated for 2 days, getting IV fluids, IV antibiotics. They did and echo and her PDA was still open but otherwise her heart was normal. Her pulmonary pressures were very high in the beginning. After 2 days they were able to wean her off the inhaled nitrous oxide and the ventilator and put her on CPAP mask. She was under the bili lights for a few days also. They started tube feeds on day 3 and we worked to get her sucking on a nipple. She tired pretty easily but each day got a bit stronger. They finally weaned her to nasal cannula and eventually room air. We spent 1 day in the special care nursery after she was deemed stable enough to leave the nicu and then I convinced the nurse practioner to send us home. She is breastfeeding like a champ now. Her respiratory issues are resolved and we are just so fortunate that everything turned out OK in the end. 

Pictures for Destiny

We participated in a video slide show made by the HH moms for Krystal to honor her sweet baby girl. Sending all our love to the VanRysell's this week.

Angel in Heaven

Last night a mom from my online playgroup held her sweet baby girl for the last time. I can't even imagine what that must feel like. I really admire her courage and strength through this terrible situation. Baby Destiny was born with a congenital heart condition called HLHS and fought the battle of a lifetime. 


Tonight I hug my babies a little bit tighter and count my blessings that they are healthy. We take these things for granted and we really shouldn't. 

An angel in the Book of Life wrote down my baby's birth & whispered as she closed the Book: "Too beautiful for this earth"

Please pray for healing and comfort for baby Destiny's family tonight. 

My Crafty Side

I've been feeling extra crafty lately. Maybe it's a part of nesting? Here are some things I've made so far for the baby.

I decided to recover the car seat to give it a little girly flair. Not sure I'm brave enough to tackle the canopy. We'll see. 

A burp cloth (more of these to come)

And a boppy cover! 

different fabric on each side: 

I even managed a zipper! 

This gorgeous fabric finally arrived in the mail and I plan on sewing a few more burp cloths with it. 

35 weeks and counting

Well I've made it to 35 weeks! I have gained a total of 14 pounds and my ankles are still there but puffy. My baby girl kicks constantly and has decided that she loves sticking her little feet up into my left rib. OW. It hurts like a son of a gun! Yup. It does. I am starting to get used to being uncomfortable. I'm trying really really hard to just treasure these last few weeks of pregnancy because I know myself and I'm crazy. I'm so crazy that I know I will actually miss all of this someday. My appointment was kind of a bust this week. The doctor wasn't in the office because he was delivering a baby. I guess that's the way it goes in the world of labor and delivery. So I was hooked up to the monitor and Cadence's heart rate wasn't showing very good variability with a rate only in the 110's. I started to feel anxious and nervous. I didn't pack a bag or even consider what *could* happen if she didn't look good on the NST. The nurse gave me some nasty soda to gulp and within a few minutes her heart rate was much more variable and the rate was up a teeny bit. Shew!! It got me thinking that I might want to pack our bags and just keep them in the car. I have lists of things I want to do before she's here. I've been chinking away at it slowly all while trying to lay down as much as possible to keep the contractions under control. The other night I had contractions every 3-4 minutes for over an hour and finally with the breakthrough pill I was able to get them to stop. But it is a reminder that she is in there and she WILL be coming out soon. We are shooting for 37 weeks at least.

Here is my view looking down.  Yes I can no longer see my feet! 

Here is another one of my horrible bathroom shots! 

Nesting

Not so much, In fact I can totally relate to this picture. It made me giggle.

Pill Popper

So the horrible thing? I pop pills all day long. Even worse? Sometimes I forget and end up needing to play catch up. That is no fun. It's 10:30 and I just realized I forgot to start my day off with my synthroid. This one has to be taken on an empty stomach. Oops. Then I have all these stupid vitamins I'm supposed to take along with my procardia. Then if I forget my zantac I am screwed! Same with the zofran. I am sitting here thinking, gee why is my esophagus burning and what's up with the nausea? Oh yeah. It would help if I had taken my morning pills. Hmph. You'd think being a nurse I'd be better at this. I am great at keeping track of pills for others but for myself I just don't give a flying flip. Unless I start to notice I feel "off". Great huh? So I just popped all my morning pills. Lined 'em up and shoved 'em down the hatch. I will be in so much trouble if I ever get really ill and need to take this crap long term.